


Blueming

by violetkareninas



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Denial of Feelings, F/M, One-Sided Attraction, Pining, Sad and Sweet, Slow Burn, spoilers for episode 92
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:41:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22761136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetkareninas/pseuds/violetkareninas
Summary: Set sometime after episode 94. Nebulous canon-discussions and “what-ifs”. Spoilers for episode 92 onwards.Caleb asks Yasha a question.
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Caleb Widogast, widojest
Comments: 2
Kudos: 75





	Blueming

The strain of the day's events sits heavily on each of the Mighty Nein. Caleb can see it in their faces, in how they take their time unrolling their bedpacks, and in how each of them bed down for the night - sluggish and slow and exhausted - under the dull dark green glow of the dome. Although Nott’s curse had been lifted, and Isharni dealt with (he struggles to say it is “solved” despite Jester’s sheer brilliance), their journey is by no means finished. He knows it would be foolish to convince himself otherwise. 

The tropical muggy air prickles uncomfortably at the back of his neck, despite the temperate atmosphere that now permeates the space around them, and he shifts on the ground, his legs curled underneath him. 

In front of him, a spell-book is splayed open, the purple and black ink softly lit by a small dancing light globule that hovers in the air. In the relative still of the night, he reads, one long finger tracing the arcane glyphs and committing them to memory. Times like these, when the rest of his friends were taken by sleep, he finds are good moments to think. 

Times like these are when the voice inside his mind is a little less loud. The doubting, cruel, wicked voice that had plagued him since he met the group. That told him he didn’t deserve the people he had met. His friends. People he cared about. Alone, in the dark he could --

“Caleb?”

He sighs, not looking up from his reading, although he instantly recognises the sleepy tone of Yasha in the quiet. 

“Ja?” he murmurs his reply, finishing his reading, before slowly closing the book and looking up. In that moment, he feels a movement in the space beside him, and sees her shuffle over towards him, her dark black and and silver hair tangled from sleep. 

“You’re not sleeping?”

He shakes his head, and gestured to the book now closed beside him. “No, I um, was just doing some reading. More spells to learn…”

“Right…” she replies, not looking at him. Instead, her gaze has settled over the group, flitting form one to another, their sleeping forms looking peaceful. 

“You-- um,” he fumbles his speech, mindful of the last time he’d spoken to Yasha alone was in this exact same situation, when she had asked him that fateful question he still hadn’t found an answer for, “is everything okay? Again?”  
She nods, and folds her arms, her shoulders dropping with another sigh. “Yeah, yeah...I’m okay. Just can’t seem to sleep either.” 

Caleb finds himself nodding in response, understanding completely despite the few words spoken. “Well a lot has happened. I’m surprised the others have nodded off so quickly.” 

“Yeah.” 

A companionable silence settles between them, in which Caleb takes the time to slide the book back into its holster, snapping the lock on it shut. Another time for reading, perhaps. He has time yet to master the next few spells he hopes to learn.

Instead he follows her gaze across the rest of the group before glancing back at her. 

“I thought more about what you said you know…” he says, his voice thoughtful and soft. 

“What part?” Yasha replies, a little confused, edging closer to him. 

He runs a hand through his hair, lithe fingers brushing through the dark auburn hair now loose around his shoulders, forcing his gaze to meet hers. 

“A lot of things have happened in such a short time, and you know, maybe you’re right. About, well” he pauses, and huffs in a ghost-like semblance of a chuckle, “that’s the question I suppose.”

Yasha sits up a little straighter now, the confusion that previously laced her brow now replaced with understanding. Silently, she wills him to go on with her expression. Or maybe it is just that he thinks she does. It doesn’t matter anyway, for as he speaks, it is like he has opened the floodgates, speech rushing out in a tumbling torrent of words. 

“We’re better with them, ja? But I- they-” he scratches at his head, and exhales heavily, rolling the next few words over in his mouth, as though his tongue has suddenly become heavy in his mouth, “she makes me feel hopeful for the person I could be. She’s changed so much about everyone. That there’s still a way...”

Yasha nods once more, an eyebrow raised in silent questioning, but does not say anything. In some small way, he is grateful for her silence. She is one of the few in the group whose silence makes him feel less judged. 

“I still feel like two people,” he continues, fumbling with the sleeve of his coat - an old habit he’s not been quiet able to shake from when he’d first met them all, tattered coat and holes in his sleeves. “But I want to be more for he-- for them. For all of them.” 

Silence stretches out before them, before it is broken by her next reply.

“So what do you plan to do?”  
He shakes his head, feeling his forehead tense as he frowns in thought.

“I don’t know... I am trying. To be better.”

“I know. I think they see that too. I don’t think they ever thought you were bad, Caleb.” 

He smiles, a thin, faint smile, and extends it like a hand of friendship, towards her. Then, as though something else crosses his mind, he hesitates and shrinks - hunching his shoulders forward and putting his hands in his lap. 

“Who...who did you think I meant? When you asked me that last time? I- ” he splays his fingers across his knees and counts the gaps in between them as he speaks. His heart races in his chest, a rhythm so loud he is so sure she’ll be able to hear it, “know you say you didn’t need to tell me who, but--”

It is now Yasha’s turn to hesitate, and he can see that in her pause the wheels turn in her mind, her eyes looking away from him to stare at the floor. 

“I...it was Nott. I just--yeah. You two seem so close and when she kissed you...” 

In that moment, Caleb feels a wave of relief wash over him. For a moment, he feels thankfully less seen. He is not sure why it is relief, but he sighs and feels tension drip and ebb out of his muscles. “Nott?” He repeats in a huff, and nods. He turns to face her, swiveling himself in the dirt and leans forward, his voice lower and hushed, suddenly highly conscious of the fact they are having this conversation in the middle of a dome full of their sleeping friends.

“I do...I do love her, yes. But not like that. She has a family. A husband who loves her and Luke and…” he runs another hand, fidgeting, through his hair, “yes, I am scared to lose her. I’d trust her with my life, and it, it might be--” he waves his hand in the air, as another wave of fear and loss descends on him in such a thick, overwhelming sense he has to stop for a moment. 

He doesn’t know if Yasha can sense or see the frustration or panic on his face, but he feels the weight of her hand on his knee nonetheless. That motion and weight settles his racing heart. “I know I am being selfish. That she’ll leave and go and one of the few good things in my life will disappear, but it’s not her.” 

There is a pause, and he watches his friend look momentarily puzzled. “Oh. Then--?” 

He continues, his hands gesticulating in the air, his voice trembling and stuttering. “I-I...I may be stupid. It’s stupid. I...do you want to know why I’m reading?” 

A change in tact, but not too off topic. As he fiddles for his other book, flicking up the clasp and opening a page of notes to show her, he thinks of what he meant by “too late” and the young man he once was, back in Rexxentrum with someone he had once loved and who so painfully had entered his life again. But then... Yasha had not meant Astrid, and although he had pictured the young woman she had once been when he’d answered Yasha, he knew things were never that simple. Feelings were never that simple.

“Okay?” she answers, watching him steadily. 

For a single, humourous moment, their talking at cross-purposes makes his mouth lift into a small smile, his gaze daring to flit over to the sleeping blue skinned tiefling nestled against the otherside of the dome, before focusing back on the task at hand. The spine of the book nestles in his open palm as he extends the writings over to her, and for a moment longer, the truest meaning of his love is nestled warm and safe against his heart. 

“I’ve been working on a spell” he explains, pointing to a few scribbled notes and drawings of lollipops and hamsters, before placing it down on the ground. He watches as she doesn’t pick it up, but stares at the writing, studying it in quiet for a moment. 

“I’ve told her and it needs tweaking and it’s only a small thing, but she deserves something that makes her happy. That she can use for...I don’t know. Because she’s done so much. It’s people like her that you can’t help but want to be better for.” 

Yasha stops for a brief second. “It’s beautiful, Caleb.” 

He puffs out his chest a little, proud. It is a rare sight, but for now he feels buoyed by the praise. “Yeah, well, she deserves it. She deserves to be happy. And-and..” he stops again, colour flushing into his cheeks, “if I can at least help someone like her smile a bit more, then…” 

He trails off, his words becoming quieter and quieter, before feeling doubt creep into the corners of his mind again and drops it with a muted shake of his head. 

“She’s special.” 

He smiles faintly. “Special, ja. She is that.” 

Yasha’s hand has lifted off his knee by now, but she places it on his hand and squeezes it, her mismatched eyes looking gently at him. 

“It’s still not too late” she says, softly. 

He cannot help but nod, breaking his own hand away from her hands, and tucking the book back into his holster. In the lull, there is a noise as Caduceus snorts and snuffles, turning to face them, and Caleb instantly sits back from Yasha, composing his facial expression and turning away slightly.

“She’s a good friend,” he replies, quietly, staring out into the distance. Already he can feel the walls he’s so good at maintaining close once more around him. Then, with some finality, fearing the conversation for where it might go, and already feeling the the thrumming of his vulnerable heart beneath his shirt, he speaks again. 

“Well, um...anyway...goodnight, Yasha.” 

He is glad she indulges him when she replies, even if he cannot see her expression as he slowly starts to bed down for sleep.

“Goodnight Caleb.”


End file.
